GoKawiilAIUC raises $40M Series A to certify AI agents' safety for enterprises
Rune Kvist, a former Anthropic employee, and Rajiv Dattani, ex-COO of AI safety group METR, launched a startup called Artificial Intelligence Underwriting Company (AIUC) that builds a third-party audit and certification system for AI agents, modeled on the SOC 2 cybersecurity standard. The company, whose clients include Cursor, Lovable, Harvey, and ElevenLabs, just raised a $40 million Series A led by Ribbit Capital with First Harmonic, adding to a prior $15 million seed round, bringing total funding to $55 million.
GoKawiil's interpretation of the reporting above, not reported fact.
As AI agents grow more capable, enterprises in regulated sectors like banking and healthcare are hesitant to deploy them without guarantees about behavior, not because the models lack intelligence but because no standard exists to verify safety compliance. AIUC's attempt to create an industry-recognized certification could become a critical trust layer that determines how quickly and safely AI agents get adopted in high-stakes industries.
- AIUC secured $40M in Series A funding led by Ribbit Capital, bringing total funding to $55M.
- The startup created AIUC-1, a SOC 2-inspired certification standard for testing AI agent safety.
- Enterprise clients like Cursor, Lovable, Harvey, and ElevenLabs are already using AIUC's services.
The Alignment Problem by Brian Christian — If AIUC's mission to keep AI agents from going rogue inside enterprises grabbed you, Brian Christian's The Alignment Problem is the deep dive into why steering machine learning systems toward human values is so hard. It's an accessible, well-reported tour of the researchers wrestling with exactly the risks that pushed founders like Kvist and Dattani to build a safety startup.
See The Alignment Problem by Brian Christian on Amazon → Affiliate link — we may earn a commission on purchases, at no extra cost to you. Product picked by AI based on this article; it is not a tested recommendation.Source: techcrunch.com — Julie Bort, 2026-09-15
Published there as: “Early Anthropic hire, former METR COO have found a way to rein in rogue AI agents”
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